spleens and waiting room hell

Hoo boy, we've got a doozie for you this time so go get a cup of coffee before you keep reading. So we went in and Becca got the Neulasta shot round about 1PM yesterday afternoon. This is a crazy-expensive new bio-tech drug that boosts white cell counts and is why we can do Becca's first four rounds of chemo in 8 weeks and not the normal 12. The idea is this drug speeds her white cell production, and low white counts are usually what delay subsequent chemo doses; the body has to be better before it can get worse again.

So fine. We got the shot, did some shopping, came home and Becca needed her afternoon nap. As soon as she lay down she had intense lower abdominal pain on the scale of which she has never felt before. So we called up our oncologist who said we needed to get into the E.R. as soon as possible. 

This kind of pain is not a known symptom of the chemotherapy, but in the back of our minds was the bit on the Neulasta product safety information sheet that started with: "Ruptured spleen (including fatal cases),..."  Our onc assured us those experiencing any side effects at all from this drug were less than 1%, but still, I think there should be a rule against putting the word "fatal" in parentheses.

So we got in the car again, Becca writhing in pain while we sat going under 20 mph behind a leisurely movers truck (shout out to that Gentle Giant driver - thanks a lot. I'm glad your cargo was transported expertly, but I think you took an extra year off my life.) 

So we got to the hospital around 3, Becca's pain slackening a bit - at least going in waves now. We should have heard the scary music cued when we saw sitting in the waiting room a very similar-looking gentleman to the one we saw when we passed by at 1 on our way to get the shot. Hmmm...

I'm sure many of you, especially those with kids, have spent time in a E.R. waiting room at some point in your lives. This is not a foreign experience to many of us. I would venture to say however that the next 9 hours in that waiting room could have been specifically designed to be our personal torture.

First, to get the serious part of this out of the way, Becca's pain had entirely subsided by about 4:15, to the point where we were considering leaving and going home. We hadn't even been checked in yet. But our awesome oncologist happened to be in the hospital at the time and came down to find us and see how we were doing. She convinced us that even given the lack of pain, we should still get checked out.

As time went on we realized that nobody was getting called. There was just such a severe lack of movement that we considered trying another ER. But no, we had to be soon now, right? It's funny how when you are in a bad situation like this you start setting the bar very low for what might make things better. For instance you say to yourself, if only those people got called, we could get their seats, and then Becca could try to nap with her head against that concrete wall instead of flopping all over the place uncomfortably... Or you think, I could go out to the car quickly and get that bag of stale crackers and some tictacs and that would kind of be like dinner... Or, well at least we know we won't catch anything from that teenager over there, he clearly is just here for his head injury that has been bleeding profusely into the bunch of paper towels he has been pressing there for two hours.

And may I rant for a bit about the tv? When will the day come when we can stop putting a television in any room that has chairs? I mean, really, this probably seemed like a good idea right after the tv was invented, but have we not yet evolved to a point where we can say you know what, Oprah and local news and wife-swap reality tv is probably hurting our patients' health more than helping it? Isn't "do no harm" the first tenet of the hippocratic oath? Suffice it to say that we were reminded over the next 4-5 hours why our tv is never on at home before 9pm. Oprah was pure torture, with the added irony that her tv audience is HUGE. These people were all doing the same thing I was: sitting in chairs watching, except they (we assume) wanted to be there. They actually got tickets and planned their day around attending this show. This is why stuff I like is usually discontinued; there just are so many more people who watch Oprah than there are who complain about it. Then we were treated to a mind-numbingly boring local newscast; glad I haven't been missing anything there. And then, oh yes. The cherry on top of the crap sundae. Reality tv where wives are swapped. I have not seen anything so insultingly insipid in a long long time. It just boggles the mind. It makes you think, well, we as a species are doomed. We may as well fold up our tent and call it a day, because I don't see how intellectual curiosity and the like can ever make a comeback when we're this far gone.

Wow, that was cleansing. Anyway, 9 hours. We were checked in at like 8, blood taken at 9, and seen just before 10. The doctor was very cool and, yes, the only one. Apparently the worst day to come to the ER is the day after a holiday like New Year's Day, because everyone waits to come in and many doctors are still taking vacation. So he did the whole interview, poked and prodded Becca, found a tender spot in the spleen area (although Becca still had no pain in general) and ordered a precautionary CAT scan. So now Becca, whose insides have now been photographed more times than Miley Cyrus, is back on the CAT-scan drill. Drink the huge amount of chalky stuff, wait for 90 minutes, take the pictures. So at 1:30 AM, way into the next shift, a new doctor told us her spleen was fine - no complications. He added that the spleen normally has a very high concentration of white blood cells, so it very well could have been the Neulasta shot that caused the (thankfully temporary) inflammation. This may have ramifications on whether we go forward with the Neulasta shots once our onc sees the results of the adventure. We'll keep you posted (if you ever come back to this blog after this tirade) :-)

So good news. And here is more good news. Thank goodness gwamma Sarah was still here to handle all the sudden babysitting. We could have managed with neighbors and farther-flung family if she wasn't here but it made that whole part of this ordeal so much easier. Also, we had planned to have a dinner party with the Bergland family, which the kids were really psyched for. When it came time in the 5pm range to call the party off, they suggested coming anyway. We thought, as much as we would love to polish off a few bottles of wine with the Berglands, why should the kids have to suffer tonight as well? Why not let them have the party? It was a hit, apparently. It figures a great party happens in our house without us even being there. Pictures streamed into my iPhone of Rachel, Carolyn, Sammy, Catherine, William, Jack (and his friend Evan) all having a smashing time. We were so jealous but so happy for the kiddles. And then to top it all off, John Bergland drove to the hospital and brought. us. dinner. I am not even kidding you. Well, it turned out he brought *me* dinner because Becca was wolfing that lovely chalk cocktail at the time (bleck.), but he hung out with us and regaled us with party stories and we felt like normal people again. Special thanks to the Berglands!